Allardyce, who worked with both Nolan and Andy Carroll at Newcastle United, believes his captain will benefit from the arrival of the Liverpool forward.

He said: "I think what is important is the delight of everybody when Andy walked through the door today.

"I think it made us all feel that little bit better when you have got a £35million centre-forward walk through the door, whether you have got him on loan or not.

"He is a quality centre-forward and he is our number one and we can hopefully play to his strength and he can hopefully help us do what we want to do and that is by winning as many football matches as we can and hopefully we can provide him with the service to score lots and lots of goals.